Prince Charming is Dead

Doing this twice with no overlap is a CHALLENGE!

1) I went to a private boarding academy for high school.
2) I think referring to high school as “academy” is pretentious at best.
3) I still habitually refer to high school as academy in my mind.
4) I was baptized by immersion at the age of thirteen.
5) I can actually remember the exact moment I tried an “unclean meat” for the first time.  (It was bacon, I was six, and it KICKED ASS)
6) I think the concept of an “unclean meat” is pretty retarded.
7) I have been an ovo-lacto vegetarian for multi-year stretches in my past.
8 ) I like my steaks rare, my ribs medium and my toast dark.
9) I didn’t try sushi/sashimi until I was in my 30s.  Now I’m trying to make up for lost time.
10) I’m from the brewpub capitol of the world.  It’s also the town with the highest per-capita number of strippers and strip clubs in America.  It always surprises me that neither of these facts seem to be particularly related.
11) I prefer brewpubs to strip clubs, and I don’t even care much for beer.
12) I have no moral issues with strip clubs, strippers or any other form of consensual adult entertainment.  If both parties understand the transaction and consent, good for them.
13) I think Hooters is creepy.  They aren’t selling adult entertainment, they’re selling sexual harassment. Pinching, slapping or touching a waitress on the ass is just unacceptable.  A “family” restaurant that peddles that kind of environment is really unacceptable.
14) I think the European sensibilities regarding violence versus sexuality on television make a whole lot more sense then the American ones.  I would rather my six-year-old see a naked person then a dead one any day.  Even IF children do learn from television, I’d rather she learn to value sex over death.
15) I can count the number of women I’ve kissed on two hands.
16) I can count the number of women I’ve been intimate with on one hand.
17) I once had a physical affair with no emotional connection.  I have never regretted anything more than that mistake.
18 ) I once had an emotional affair with no physical contact.  I have never truly regretted it for even one moment.  Ever.
19) I don’t believe either affair was moral or right.  I have learned a great deal from both of them, and can quite honestly say that I would never allow myself to emotionally or physically enter a place where that could happen again.
20) When I was a teenager, I was distressingly “quick to fire” under pressure; I considered thirty seconds to be a “long time” to last.
21) Now I have the opposite problem, I only “fire” about a third of the time after intense effort. I’m more likely to cramp up or become exhausted after more than an hour of exertion.
22) Number 21 scared me enough that I talked to my doctor about it.  After an in depth check-up and my first prostate exam, I was found to be in very good health.  So I’ve started running cross-country again to build up my intense exercise stamina.
23) If 21 and 22 sound like I’m bragging, keep in mind that it’s been more negative on my sex life than positive. It’s very easy for a partner to take that problem personally, no matter what you tell them to the contrary.
24) My sexual ideal lies somewhere on the spectrum between the end of the Keira Knightly “Pride and Prejudice” and Tara Patrick’s “Karma Sutra.”  Yes, it’s a broad range.  No, no sex happens at the end of “Pride and Prejudice”.  If you don’t know who Tara Patrick is, PLEASE don’t google her at work.
25) I knew Tara Patrick “in real life” before she became famous.  I knew her when she was shy, willow-thin and wore braces. I have every reason to believe she is just as nice today as she was then.
26) Milla Jovovich (of Resident Evil, The Fifth Element and other movies) once pushed me off a boat dock and into a frigid lake.  It was about a month before she went to film a Disney Channel movie (“The Night Train to Kathmandu”).  We were eleven or twelve, I knew she had modeled, but I just thought of her as my cousin’s skinny friend.  If she remembers me, and I doubt she does, it will be as the boy who dumped ice cream on her on accident.  It would not be a “happy” memory, so I hope she doesn’t.
27) I was once ridiculed on a major area radio broadcast as “Mr. Potato Head”
28 ) while not related to 27, I was called “Fathead” by my grandfather until I was six or seven years old.
29) I have attended more funerals in my life then weddings.
30) I’ve never been to a funeral where it rained.
31) I’ve been to three weddings where it poured.  At one of them lightning caused a power outage.
32) I have been to a wedding that lasted longer than the marriage (and I don’t mean figuratively, the wedding ceremony lasted more than four hours, the marriage didn’t even last two).
33) I have attended two “gay” weddings.  One for two guys, one for two ladies.
34) I actively believe that two consenting adults should be allowed to get married, regardless of gender.
35) I also have no personal issue if three consenting adults want to get married.  My only concern with polygamy is equal treatment for everyone involved.  Which happens to be my big concern in two person marriages as well…
36) While I am irretrievably straight, I have no qualms with people who aren’t. Or can’t decide.  Or just don’t know.
37) I’ve certainly met gay people who creeped me out…but then I’ve met more straight people who creeped me out.  It works the same as race for me.  I’ve known some black/hispanic/asian people who creeped me out, but I’ve met far more white ones who did.  I don’t think that’s a racial issue or a sexuality issue, just a location issue.  I meet more straight whites, so there’s a better chance that straight whites will annoy me.
38 ) People who either can’t or won’t grasp number 37 annoy me more than anyone. I have no patience for bigots of any stripe.
39) I’m more liberal than most people. Who are democrats. On the far left of the party.
40) If I was president I would federalize Healthcare, Energy Production, Education (both higher and lower) and Transportation with the same level of federal control as we exert over our armed forces.
41) I think Nurses, Doctors and Teachers should be as heavily budgeted as the defense department.  Elder care, cancer research and HIV/AIDS vaccines should have the same scale effort as the moon shot or World War II.
42) I believe that if high school graduates can get money for college by being soldiers, shouldn’t we give them the same level of support for being nurses or teachers?
43) I seriously believe ALL Oil/Natural Gas/Coal/Hydroelectric resources should be federally managed and citizen owned.  Citizens can own the national parks…but not the natural resources?  The cost of a gallon of gas should be ten percent over the cost of production.  Currently that would be somewhere between $1.32 and $1.67 depending on how close you live to the refinery belt.
44) I believe as a nation we should be sponsoring, creating and displaying more art.
45) My favorite artists are Frank Frazetta, Masamune Shirow, Raphael and the masters of the Art Nouveau movement (Aubrey Beardsley, Ivan Bilibin, Alfonse Mucha)
46) I had a subscription to Playboy in college.  I really did read it for the articles.  And the cartoons.
47) I still read Playboy on occasion.  If the cover was more understated I’d still subscribe.
48 ) My favorite cigars are “Playboy by Don Diego” followed closely by “Hemmingway by Arturo Fuente”
49) I prefer either well aged (and port cask finished) Scotch or Knappogue Castle Irish whisky.  On the rocks.
50) I believe that mixing scotch with ANYTHING should be a capital crime.
51) White over Red, Amabile over Secco, Italian over French.
52) Belgian over Swiss, Milk over Dark
53) FOR THE LOVE OF GOD don’t put vegetables in dessert.  Carrot Cake, I’m looking at you.  And the Rhubarb Pie.  But Pumpkin, you get a hall pass.
54) Phad Thai with Tofu and Shrimp.  BEST. MEAL. EVER.
55) Wailua from Kona Brewing Company is the only beer I’ve ever had that made me want another.
56) Most people use Word, Excel and Outlook on the job.  I do 99% of my job in Toad and vi over PuTTY.  If that made sense to you, I’m sorry.
57) I can program in more than a dozen languages.  I do about 99% of my work in SQL, PLSQL and Java.
58 ) I HATE Java.
59) I LOVE coffee.
60) I’ll drink Starbucks under duress when no better option is available.
61) I’ve had Folgers Instant Coffee that was better than Starbucks.
62) I love Chai tea more than any other hot beverage.  With honey.
63) I believe in my heart-of-hearts that Starbucks Frappachinos were developed by a cabal of evil conspirators to enslave mankind under the yoke of obesity.
64) I am honestly afraid of “Mad Cow” disease.  Mostly because I ate burgers in England in the early 90′s.
65) I didn’t know I was at risk until the Red Cross refused to take my blood donation after 9-11.
66) Now I’m paranoid and will only eat ground beef if it was organically grown.
67) Which is ok, because I prefer organically grown products anyway.
68 ) I refuse to eat eggs that aren’t from free range and vegetarian fed chickens.
69) If you think that’s easy, you need to find out more about where your eggs come from.
70) The moment that I truly grasped what Dukkha means was probably the most significant spiritual moment of my life.  I will never be able to watch the end of a Superbowl broadcast the same way again.  (Non-”Fresh Air” listeners won’t understand that at all).
71) I have answered the “Faith” section of government or legal documents with the following answers:  Seventh Day Adventist, Christian, Sometimes, “In science”, Buddhist, and “Not Applicable”
72) I would answer that question with “Zen Christian” today.
73) If I ever returned to organized Christianity it would probably be to Catholicism.  I love the ritual of it.
74) Which is odd because I could probably be an effective protestant minister.
75) I have preached before hundreds of people before.  The experience was slightly more addictive than cigarettes.
76) I would like to get my bachelors in history.  And classical literature.
77) I am currently planning on learning French in the next year and Russian not long after.
78 ) One of my best friends from high school has a “mail order bride” from the Ukraine.
79) I was very skeptical when he first told me how they met.  She is neither mail-order nor money grubbing NOR simpering housewife.  Which just shows my prejudices before I met her.
80) While I wouldn’t advocate it as a method for anyone, I sincerely think their online experience was more honest than match.com or ehamrony.  At least they both knew there were barriers and pitfalls.
81) I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t considered it since meeting her.
82) I’d be lying if I said I thought it would actually work for me.
83) After failing two marriages, and letting my daughter move thousands of miles away, I realized that I am an utter disappointment to my parents.
84) When you come from a very close (and large) family, that’s a hard thing to accept.
85) I am only the third member of my extended family (covering almost 300 people) to get a divorce in the last four generations.  I am the first man to do so.  Both women were being abused.  I don’t have an acceptable reason.
86) Yes, I realize that the logic behind 85 is utter crap, but that doesn’t change the circumstances.
87) When my second marriage began to fail, my family actively began avoiding me.  Not because they were upset with me…because they didn’t know how to interact with me.  I had become so alien to them that they didn’t even know how to speak to me.
88 ) I don’t admit it out loud, but 87 and another event last year almost led me to change my last name and start over.
89) I don’t admit it to anyone but my therapist, but 87 almost cost me my life.  I don’t believe in “gesture of suicide”…if you’re gonna go, use a gun, make it quick.
90) I can also gladly say that I am long past that dark place.  Hopefully never to return.
91) My best female friend is trying to convince me that instead of being the prince that rescues the princess, maybe I should let her find me…let her in and be rescued from my own dragons.  And if not rescued, than at least fight them together, side by side.
92) Deep down inside, I don’t think I deserve to be loved.  I’ve already failed.  I’ve already fallen in battle.
93) That’s the dragon that I can’t seem to fight.  I can’t even see it when I’m battling it.  It’s always hiding in the shadows and burning me in the dark.
94) I am secretly afraid that I am such damaged goods that I will never find my true love.
95) I have never admitted that before. Not even to my therapist.
96) I do not accept a victim mentality, I believe in standing up, dusting off and trying again.
97) I rarely give up.  Which is dangerous when playing poker. It is equally bad when playing blackjack or craps.
98 ) I love to gambol, but I don’t EVER play with money I can’t afford to lose.
99)  I will always throw the dice in life rather than playing it safe.  Always.
100) If life is a game, and love is the answer, and we’re all players…then here’s to hoping the third times the charm?